n of the Thirty-ninth Congress proposed, as their plan
of Reconstruction, a Constitutional Amendment. It was a bond of public
justice and public safety combined, to be embodied in our national
Constitution, to show to our posterity that patriotism is a virtue and
rebellion is a crime. These terms were more magnanimous than were ever
offered in any country under like circumstances. They were kind, they
were forbearing, they were less than we had a right to demand; but in
our anxiety, in our desire to close up this question, we made the
proposition. How was it received? They trampled upon it, they spat
upon it, they repudiated it, and said they would have nothing to do
with it. They were determined to have more power after the rebellion
than they had before.

When this proposition was repudiated, we came together again, at the
second session of the same Congress, to devise some other plan of
reconstruction in place of the proffer that had been spurned. We put
the basis of our reconstruction, first, upon every loyal man in the
South, and then we gave the ballot also to every man who had only been
a traitor. The persons we excluded, for the present, from suffrage in
the South, were not the thousands who struggled in the rebel army, not
the millions who had given their adhesion to it, but only those men
who had sworn allegiance to the Constitution and then added to treason
the crime of perjury.

Though we demand no indemnity for the past, no banishment, no
confiscations, no penalties for the offended law, there is one thing
we do demand, there is one thing we have the power to demand, and that
is security for the future, and that we intend to have, not only in
legislation, but imbedded in the imperishable bulwarks of our national
Constitution, against which the waves of secession may dash in future
but in vain. We intend to have those States reconstructed on such
enduring corner-stones that posterity shall realize that our fallen
heroes have not died in vain.

CHAPTER I.

OPENING SCENES.

Momentous Events of the Vacation -- Opening of the Senate --
Mr. Wade -- Mr. Sumner -- Mr. Wilson -- Mr. Harris -- Edward
McPherson -- As Clerk of the preceding Congress, he calls
the House to order -- Interruption of Roll-call by Mr.
Maynard -- Remarks by Mr. Brooks -- His Colloquy with Mr.
Stevens -- Mr. Colfax elected Speaker -- His Inaugural
Address -- The Test Oath.

The Thirty-ninth